Faking It Assignment: Research

For this assignment, Faking It, i started off using the Internet to research different types of fashion magazines and their typical conventions.
Researcgh Into Fashion Magazines:

Starting off looking at high gloss magazine such as Vogue and Elle, they all followed the theme of having a A List celebrity on their front cover and the cover generally looks sophisticated. The font of the title is at the top of the cover and both Vogue and Elle use the same font with the serif edges to make it look high class. The design and colours used are thought about and match with everything on the cover and the models are posing strong and in a classy way .

For example, below Beyonce is on both covers of Vogue and Elle. In Vogue she is wearing blue and the background and title all match together. In Elle she is wearing purple and the colours of the cover are black and pink. 
For high end fashion magazines such as these to be using Beyonce on their front covers it proves the debating issue of models being labelled "too fat" as being completely wrong, and as women as young as teenagers who are influenced by these types of magazines, it sets a good example that you have to have a tiny waist just to look good. 
I did some research into models in the fashion industry and the way they should apparently look. I found that women who were healthy sizes were being criticised and turned down for modeling jobs for being "too fat". A link from the Internet i read about two girls, one of which was a healthy size 12 and the other  a size zero model. 
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-418780/The-stunning-size-12-model-branded-fat-TV-competition.html
Everyone seems to think that to be a model you have to have the perfect "skinny" body. This is an issue which aspiring teenagers and models think they should look like, which is in fact not healthy. The debate continues with models who are healthy sizes and models who are size zero, the fact is that whatever size or shape you are because as long as you are healthy and happy with your shape then no one can put you down. People want to see healthy looking models on the front of magazines and not models who have been pressured and forced in to size zero.
Another story i found whilst doing my research:
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/33307721
I find this story shocking as the girl was actually a model for big name designer, Ralph Lauren. I don't think its right for high end names such as him to be taking this approach as aspiring fashion designers and models could be heavily influenced by his work.
For the rest of the assignment i had to create three different designs of either a magazine front cover, book cover or CD case and produce a "spoof". I chose to design two different magazine covers using both Elle and Vogue and touched on issues surrounding the "perfect" model and acting responsibly on a night out. 
After then completing my research i moved on to choosing a design and making it on Photoshop.

Faking It Assignment: Rough Designs

Rough Designs:

The first of my designs is based on the idea of how models look and are portrayed in the media. The design is of a magazine cover for Elle which shows a skinny looking, catwalk model with the headlining title of the magazine saying "Get Into Shape For Summer 2010". This is a contradiction of the headline of the magazine and the model used on the front. The model is in fact "too skinny" but being labelled as needing to go on a diet for the summer. The sub titles around the edge all link in with the main centre image of the model. Real life stories including, "Turned away for being too fat" and "Told to get surgery or lose my job". These are all issues which affect models currently and i chose to have this type of design to show the reality of this sort of attitude towards the way people look. The sub titles to the right of the cover are spoofs of the content magazines usually involve for example, "100 Must Have Cosmetics To Make You Look Skinny". The research i have gathered above is evidence to back up my idea and that is is a real issue in the media. These are the typical headlining titles on magazine which i have spoofed to link in with the theme of the model and magazine. The text i have used is a tall skinny font which ties in with the whole convention of the magazine, ELLE, the model and the font.

The second of my designs was based on the way people behave on nights out. The front cover image is of 2 women who have been on a night out and one of them is led on the floor while the other tries to lift her up. The headlining title is "How To Make The Most Of The Festive Season" on the front of the Decemeber issue of Vogue magazine. The front title is suggestive towards the way people act while out and especially with Christmas soon that it is the party season. Magazines usually publisise the fact that christmas is a time to celebrate but they never show the reality of some nights out which is why i am spoofing a high gloss fashion magazine such as  Vogue. This is a magazine which is used highly in the fashion industry just like ELLE and which young teeneagers will read and aspire to.

Faking It Assignment: Making My Design

Making My Design:

I chose to make the first of my rough designs which was the ELLE magazine cover. The magazine must have all the typical conventions of a high gloss magazine cover including the title, sub titles, barcode and front image.

 I started making it using Photoshop and used my research and gathered images to form layers and eventually a whole magazine cover. I used this image of a catwalk model which i first cut out using the magnetic lasso tool and then need to make her look skinny. This was the original image i used to start with in Photoshop. To make her look skinny i firstly cut out her head which i kept the same, and went to Edit, Transform, Distort. This then gave me the option to make her "fatter" or "skinnier" by dragging the cursor left and right. Once i had made her look "skinny" i then pasted her head back on top of her body and merged the layers to keep them together.

I then created more layers this time with text boxes to make the title and sub titles on the magazine cover. To make the ELLE title i found a text which was most closest to the font and used Window, Character to change the length, height and spacing between the font to make it even closer to the actual font (see right picture). I then used this process to make each font individual to where it was on the magazine cover, making some bigger/taller/more spaced than others. I then changed the colour of the text making it relevant to the images used.

I then draged everything on to the same layer with a background image, model and titles/sub titles. The last thing left for me to do was to play around with the layout and make it look like an actual magazine cover.